The Korea Herald

Iraq key oil player ‘for next 20 years’

IndustryJul 17, 2011

BAGHDAD (AFP) ― Iraq will be the key player in international oil politics over the next two decades, the country’s top government official for the energy sector said on Saturday.“If we continue along the path we are on, Iraq will over the next two decades be the country that sets oil policy in the world in terms of price, supply and demand,” Deputy Prime Minister Hussein al-Shahristani said at a c
U.S. consumer confidence unexpectedly falls

IndustryJul 17, 2011
Regulators close four small banks in three states

World BusinessJul 17, 2011

WASHINGTON (AP) ― Regulators on Friday shut down four small banks in three states, boosting to 55 the number of U.S. bank failures this year.The overall pace of closures, however, has slowed this year as banks work their way through piles of bad debt. A slow, but improving U.S. economy also has helped stem the number of bank casualties this year. By this time last year, regulators had closed 96 ba
Eight banks flunk European stress test

World BusinessJul 17, 2011

FRANKFURT, Germany (AP) ― Eight of 90 European banks flunked stress tests projecting how they would fare in another recession, and 16 more barely passed ― but analysts doubted Friday’s results would succeed in restoring confidence in the continent’s shaky financial sector.Some countries challenged the results as inaccurate and overly pessimistic, saying they would not force their weaker banks to r
Congress seeks debt solution, Obama goes to public

World BusinessJul 17, 2011

On debt crisis, Obama makes direct appeal to U.S. public: ‘We are all in this together’WASHINGTON (AP) ― President Barack Obama appealed for public support Saturday to push Congress to avert an unprecedented default on America’s national debt as lawmakers worked on dual tracks to reach an elusive deal.Obama wants lawmakers to approve a giant package that would not only prevent a default by raising
Former Assembly Speaker Lee to win ‘Proud Korean Award’

PeopleJul 17, 2011

Former National Assembly Speaker Lee Man-seop and Philip Kim, a professor of physics at Columbia University, will win the Proud Korean Award from the Korean American Leadership Foundation in Los AngelesLee and Kim each will receive $10,000 in prize money with a plaque. The award ceremony will take place at the Marriott Hotel, Los Angeles on Aug. 7. Lee Man-seop (left) and Philip KimThe L.A.-based
Scientists develop efficient oil-refining zeolite catalyst

PeopleJul 17, 2011

South Korean scientists said Friday that they have developed a highly efficient nanoporous industrial catalyst that can have a considerable impact on chemical and oil-refining sectors.The team of scientists led by Ryoo Ryong, a chemistry professor at the Korea Advanced Institute of Science and Technology, said the solid zeolite compound developed in the laboratory has a reaction speed five to 10 t
Disabled lawmaker offers fresh insight

PeopleJul 17, 2011

Former judge Rep. Park says disabled need greater employment supportFor the needy people, welfare is a right given them, not charity, an opposition lawmaker said Sunday, urging the government to expand welfare for the socially and economically marginalized people with disabilities.A polio victim himself, Rep. Park Eun-soo of the main opposition Democratic Party said that one out of 10 South Korean
[David Ignatius] The world according to Murdoch

ViewpointsJul 17, 2011

WASHINGTON ― Rupert Murdoch’s News Corp. is a company with a chip on its shoulder. His defy-the-establishment sensibility has built a print and television empire, to the despair of more traditional (and, Murdoch would say, elitist) rivals. But the phone-hacking scandal that now envelops one of Murdoch’s British publications shows how corrosive this style of anything-goes journalism can be. It’s be
TSA can be smarter about passenger patdowns

ViewpointsJul 17, 2011

When you read last week that terrorists have discussed surgically implanting explosives in passengers so they could blow up airliners, did you feel a little less aggrieved about the TSA agents who supposedly patted down a 95-year-old woman in a wheelchair?That patdown was a late-June outrage du jour about the Transportation Security Administration. The story: The elderly woman was patted down and,
[Editorial] Japan’s nonsensical move

EditorialJul 17, 2011

Japan’s Foreign Ministry has perplexed us by ordering its officials not to use Korean Air for a month starting today. The reason for this ban was a demonstration flight the private airliner recently conducted with its newly introduced Airbus A380 over Dokdo, Korea’s easternmost islets.One may wonder why the Japanese ministry instructed a boycott of the Korean carrier for test flying its newest pas
[Editorial] Korea-China defense ties

EditorialJul 17, 2011

South Korea and China have agreed to restore bilateral military relations, which have remained sour following North Korea’s torpedoing of the South’s warship Cheonan in March last year and subsequent shelling of Yeonpyeong Island in October. The agreement was reached between Defense Minister Kim Kwan-jin and his Chinese counterpart Liang Guanglie during their talks in Beijing on Friday.According t
[Shashi Tharoor] Is Kabul ready to stand alone?

ViewpointsJul 17, 2011

NEW DELHI ― U.S. President Barack Obama’s announcement of the start of American troop withdrawals from Afghanistan, and his administration’s increasing emphasis on reconciliation with the Taliban, have been studied attentively in one capital that has a large stake in the outcome ― New Delhi.India has no troops in Afghanistan, but it has invested roughly $1.5 billion to help reconstruct the country
[Peter Goldmark] Debt threats plague the United States and Europe

ViewpointsJul 17, 2011

The months ahead in 2011 will constitute a summer to remember for a long, long time.The world’s two largest economies ― the United States and Europe ― are drifting toward brutal days of reckoning. Both economies face severe financial and economic challenges.Failure by either or both would send severe shocks through the already limping global economy. In the United States, a fiercely aroused but in
[Daniel Akst] Obama rewards GOP stonewalling

ViewpointsJul 17, 2011

Everyone knows you can train a dog by rewarding the behavior you want Rover to repeat. But Barack Obama has always been ambitious, so he trains Republicans. The behavior he rewards is intransigence. Every time congressional Republicans adopt an inflexible position ― such as their current no-tax-hikes stance in negotiations over raising the federal debt ceiling ― the president rewards them with a t